A
stretch of the border wall between the U.S. and Mexico was adorned with
a set of pink see-saws this week — allowing children (and grownups) to
play together across the barrier. The event was "filled with joy,
excitement, and togetherness," says architect Ronald Rael, a leader of
the project.
The
seesaws were installed on Sunday, when their steel beams were eased
through the slats of the tall fence that divides Sunland Park, N.M.,
from Colonia Anapra — a community on the western side of Ciudad Juárez
in Mexico.
"Everyone
was very happy and excited to engage the seesaws," Rael says via email,
describing the mood at Sunday's event. And while he admits to being a
little nervous about the completion of a project that had been brewing
for 10 years, he says it went off without a hitch.
"It was peaceful and fun — a day at a park for the children and mothers of Anapra," Rael says.
Click this link and hopefully you can see the fun. Be sure to also view the other images by selecting the side arrows:
https://www.instagram.com/p/B0fY2R6hfKr/
The seesaws were created by Rael and fellow architect Virginia San Fratello; the two are partners in a design firm. By installing playground toys, they sought to tweak the meaning of a border fence.
Click this link and hopefully you can see the fun. Be sure to also view the other images by selecting the side arrows:
https://www.instagram.com/p/B0fY2R6hfKr/
The seesaws were created by Rael and fellow architect Virginia San Fratello; the two are partners in a design firm. By installing playground toys, they sought to tweak the meaning of a border fence.
"The wall became a literal fulcrum for U.S. - Mexico relations" once the seesaws were added, Rael said in an Instagram post about the project.
Rael,
who teaches at the University of California, Berkeley, added, "children
and adults were connected in meaningful ways on both sides with the
recognition that the actions that take place on one side have a direct
consequence on the other side."
In
a statement to NPR, Rael and San Fratello say the installation was made
to be temporary, adding that the seesaws — fabricated in Juarez — could
be installed quickly.
As
for why they turned an idea from 2009 into a reality in 2019, they say
the project "is incredibly important at a time when relationships
between people on both sides are being severed by the wall and the
politics of the wall."
To
help install the seesaws, Rael and San Fratello collaborated with
Colectivo Chopeke, a Juarez-based artist collective. And when everything
was finally in place, children from Anapra joined Rael in riding on the
seats, bouncing up and down with their fellow riders on the U.S. side.
Of
course, it's unlikely that three seesaws could recast the tense and
difficult discussions around U.S. immigration policies that have divided
families from loved ones. Reflecting the high-profile attention the
border has gotten, both Mexican soldiers and U.S. Border Patrol agents
were present during Sunday's event.
"U.S. Border Patrol did not have a problem with it, nor did soldiers from Mexico," Rael says.
The
bright pink teetertotters brought a new chance to see the border
through the eyes of people who live along the divide — and for those
people to see each other in a new light, even if their view was confined
by tall steel slats.
"The joy that was shared this day on both sides is something that will stay with me forever," Rael said on
Instagram Tuesday, in an update about the project. With that message,
he posted a video of people playing on the pink seesaws, smiling at each
other through the fence. 
Ronald Rael, architect, and one of the project leaders.
Even
before Sunday, the concept of putting seesaws on a border fence had
already drawn acclaim for Rael and San Fratello. They note that their
original drawings and models for a "Teeter-Totter Wall" are held by the
Museum of Modern Art in New York and the San Francisco Museum of Modern
Art.
While
the original idea sprang forth as a way to contemplate trade and labor
imbalances, the seesaws have taken on added meaning as President Trump
has imposed strict policies along the border and vehemently spoken out
against illegal immigration.
As
Rael and San Fratello said via email, the seesaws are meant to tell the
story of "how the actions on one side of the border have direct
consequences on the other."
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